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I'm going to play devil's advocate for a moment: ...do we really need all these articles? Does it matter what reason we have to publish if no one reads it? And if we *knew* that articles weren't being read, could we use that as an argument *against* having to publish or perish? So would it make sense to run a carefully constructed survey to elicit the *reading* habits of the research community before we decide what needs to be done to support the *writing*? Just a thought. Cheers. Fil Karel van der Waarde wrote: > Dear all, > > The discussions in the last week left me with a slightly bitter taste. > There seem to be two intentions to publish: > - to 'disseminate information', > - to satisfy administrative requirements. > > The second intention is becoming so important, that the first one is > only for 'a happy few' who can afford to wait to present worthwhile > materials. > > An enormous group of authors has to put pressure on reviewers and > editors because: > - I need this publication to start a PhD > - I need this publication to obtain a PhD > - I need this publication to support my PhD-viva > - I need this publication for staff evaluations > - Our department needs this publication for an assessment/accreditation > > The financial and personal consequences of the decisions of reviewers > and editors are substantial. Administrators base their decisions on the > views of editors and reviewers: 'it has been peer reviewed, so it must > be good'. > > Despite the severe consequences for the authors, we still expect that > 'reviewing' and 'editing' must be done for free. It's part of the fun, > but it requires a lot of time. I'm afraid that this has reached its limits. > > > Option 1: The example of open review processes Chris Rust mentions on > biomedcentral.com provides a real alternative. Direct contact between > authors and reviewers with the aim to 'disseminate and discuss' new > findings. Wonderful. Unfortunately, there is another side. The > instructions for authors state: > - "Acta Veterinaria Scandinavica" levies an article-processing charge > for every accepted article, to cover the costs incurred by open access > publication. In 2008 the article-processing charge is £1000 (¤1260, > US$2000)." > or > - "AIDS Research and Therapy" levies an article-processing charge for > every accepted article, to cover the costs incurred by open access > publication. In 2008 the article-processing charge is £850 (¤1070, > US$1700)." > > In other words: If you want to publish, you pay per article. Now it is > possible to calculate the costs of the administrative policies. > > > Option 2: An alternative requirement for a PhD-student could be to set > up at least one 'digital peer-reviewed academic journal'. That will > solve many of the problems mentioned this week. > > biomedcentral.com makes the second option fairly painless: > http://www.biomedcentral.com/independent/starting > > > Nobody will have time to read much of it, but that is not the aim. The > aim is to satisfy the administrative requirements in such a way that we > can still have a few enjoyable discussions about the topics that really > matter with people that we really like to work with. > > > The domain names http://www.designresearchcentral.com and > http://www.desrescentral.com are still available ... > > Kind regards, > Karel. > [log in to unmask] -- Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng. Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Ryerson University 350 Victoria St, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3, Canada Tel: 416/979-5000 ext 7749 Fax: 416/979-5265 Email: [log in to unmask] http://deseng.ryerson.ca/~fil/